3 ms·

> I don't know if it's Google that is dying. I tried to use Google to see what would be good brand to replace a decade old small electrical appliance that fail

> I don't know if it's Google that is dying. I tried to use Google to see what would be good brand to replace a decade old small electrical appliance that failed a couple of months ago. Absolutely none of the results were helpful until I tried the "append Reddit to the search terms" trick. Immediately, I found a link someone had shared to a consumer reports style review of different brands at different price points. The content I wanted was out there, but Google is now optimized for ad revenue, not finding the content I asked for.

Jensson 4y ago
It is impressive that Google manages to rank reddit threads very well though. They don't have reddits internal data, do they look at reddit upvote scores or what? Why would the helpful thread be higher ranked than all the content spam on reddit? Google must do something really clever in order to be so good at indexing useful reddit threads.
- davidkuennen 4y ago
  I would think they apply their normal algorithms. If it's a good article that's upvoted a lot, it should also be linked in some places and thus get a higher search score.
  - grumpy_coder 4y ago
    Though it's not finding the article. It's finding a link to the article on Reddit. I hope people aren't linking to the Reddit thread...
    - comfypotato 4y ago
      The way the original pagerank algorithm works, links to the original article would increase the score of a Reddit post linking to the article. Why Reddit posts are ranked higher in a default search I’m not sure, but this would definitely explain why site:Reddit works.
  - Jensson 4y ago
    Do people link to reddit threads a lot? I'd assume such a signal would be very noisy and not very reliable, so spam sites would just link a lot to their content spam on reddit.
- bitxbitxbitcoin 4y ago
  Like giving Reddit a higher “page score” than other websites?
  - Jensson 4y ago
    No, I mean why does it find the right reddit thread instead any of the billions of other reddit threads? That can't be trivial to do since reddit themselves don't do it well.
    - bitxbitxbitcoin 4y ago
      Gotcha. Google search ranking threads versus Reddit search ranking threads. I’d posit that Google counts the upvotes and other signals on the thread to calculate EAT or whatever.
    - codexon 4y ago
      It was probably linked to by other websites. I've been seeing more news organizations directly linking to reddit, and I believe Google manually boosted reddit results a few years ago. You used to never see them in search results, but now they have started showing up.
- IAmNotACellist 4y ago
  I've found that Google is willing to return one or two Reddit links but then reverts to its usual SEO crapspam for the rest of the results. Even "site:reddit.com" only returns only a fraction of the discussions related to the topic. The site's been around for over a decade, and most topics have been discussed dozens of times or more.
Red_Leaves_Flyy 4y ago
The Reddit trick is increasingly less viable as marketers are astroturfing Reddit.
- giraffe_lady 4y ago
  That's been a significant factor on reddit since 2008 or so. It may be getting worse or the dynamics changing, idk, but it's nowhere near new.
  - VHRanger 4y ago
    One advantage is that Reddit has a distributed network of volunteer mods whos incentives align with that of their own subreddit. Google on the other hand has automated centralized content moderation.
- Night_Thastus 4y ago
  Agreed. What I've seen become more common is the following: * They'll start by having <5 real comments that seem like a legitimate person wrote them * Account suddenly starts just re-posting very popular older posts, and other bots chime in that also copy the top comments from that post letter-for-letter * Account goes on to shill some product
euos 4y ago
It's just the state of the web. Google search uses metrics for the web sites (number of links, etc) so Reddit threads do not rank high compared to real web sites.
ultrarunner 4y ago
Google used to have a "Forums" tab right on the top that would filter results to random PHPbb instances and the like. It was generally pretty great. As far as I'm concerned, the decision to remove that was when Google started dying.
mehdix 4y ago
This is my experience too, every time I'm looking for meaningful results, after searching my bookmarks of course.
TwoNineFive 4y ago
Uh, reddit is 99% influencers influencing these days. You enthusiastically consumed and even recommended an ad and have no idea. You can't even tell who they are anymore. How do I know? Because I've been paid to post on reddit. I only do it for products I've actually used and things I like, but I got paid nobody has a clue. Not even you.

Jensson 4y ago

It is impressive that Google manages to rank reddit threads very well though. They don't have reddits internal data, do they look at reddit upvote scores or what? Why would the helpful thread be higher ranked than all the content spam on reddit? Google must do something really clever in order to be so good at indexing useful reddit threads.

davidkuennen 4y ago
I would think they apply their normal algorithms. If it's a good article that's upvoted a lot, it should also be linked in some places and thus get a higher search score.
- grumpy_coder 4y ago
  Though it's not finding the article. It's finding a link to the article on Reddit. I hope people aren't linking to the Reddit thread...
  - comfypotato 4y ago
    The way the original pagerank algorithm works, links to the original article would increase the score of a Reddit post linking to the article. Why Reddit posts are ranked higher in a default search I’m not sure, but this would definitely explain why site:Reddit works.
- Jensson 4y ago
  Do people link to reddit threads a lot? I'd assume such a signal would be very noisy and not very reliable, so spam sites would just link a lot to their content spam on reddit.
bitxbitxbitcoin 4y ago
Like giving Reddit a higher “page score” than other websites?
- Jensson 4y ago
  No, I mean why does it find the right reddit thread instead any of the billions of other reddit threads? That can't be trivial to do since reddit themselves don't do it well.
  - bitxbitxbitcoin 4y ago
    Gotcha. Google search ranking threads versus Reddit search ranking threads. I’d posit that Google counts the upvotes and other signals on the thread to calculate EAT or whatever.
  - codexon 4y ago
    It was probably linked to by other websites. I've been seeing more news organizations directly linking to reddit, and I believe Google manually boosted reddit results a few years ago. You used to never see them in search results, but now they have started showing up.
IAmNotACellist 4y ago
I've found that Google is willing to return one or two Reddit links but then reverts to its usual SEO crapspam for the rest of the results. Even "site:reddit.com" only returns only a fraction of the discussions related to the topic. The site's been around for over a decade, and most topics have been discussed dozens of times or more.

Red_Leaves_Flyy 4y ago

The Reddit trick is increasingly less viable as marketers are astroturfing Reddit.

giraffe_lady 4y ago
That's been a significant factor on reddit since 2008 or so. It may be getting worse or the dynamics changing, idk, but it's nowhere near new.
- VHRanger 4y ago
  One advantage is that Reddit has a distributed network of volunteer mods whos incentives align with that of their own subreddit. Google on the other hand has automated centralized content moderation.
Night_Thastus 4y ago
Agreed. What I've seen become more common is the following: * They'll start by having <5 real comments that seem like a legitimate person wrote them * Account suddenly starts just re-posting very popular older posts, and other bots chime in that also copy the top comments from that post letter-for-letter * Account goes on to shill some product

euos 4y ago

It's just the state of the web. Google search uses metrics for the web sites (number of links, etc) so Reddit threads do not rank high compared to real web sites.

ultrarunner 4y ago

Google used to have a "Forums" tab right on the top that would filter results to random PHPbb instances and the like. It was generally pretty great. As far as I'm concerned, the decision to remove that was when Google started dying.

mehdix 4y ago

This is my experience too, every time I'm looking for meaningful results, after searching my bookmarks of course.

TwoNineFive 4y ago

Uh, reddit is 99% influencers influencing these days. You enthusiastically consumed and even recommended an ad and have no idea. You can't even tell who they are anymore. How do I know? Because I've been paid to post on reddit. I only do it for products I've actually used and things I like, but I got paid nobody has a clue. Not even you.